1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an image recording apparatus which records an image by irradiating laser light onto a recording medium such as a plate wrapped around a drum.
2. Description of Related Art
Conventionally, technology exists to improve a recording strength of a laser light irradiating a recording region on a plate (such as a flexographic plate, a letterpress plate, and the like) used in CTP (Computer to Plate) printing in order to reliably record an image on the plate.
A known example of the conventional technology of this type is an image recording apparatus including a displacer and a controller controlling the displacer, the displacer relatively displacing a recording head having a laser light source in a main scanning direction (drum circumferential direction) and a secondary scanning direction (drum axial direction) with respect to a recording medium. The controller controls the displacer.
As shown in FIG. 12, when image recording is performed on a heat-reactive plate P, (such as a thermal CTP plate, a flexographic CTP plate, and the like) using a recording head (not depicted) having a plurality of laser light sources lined up at predetermined intervals, the recording strength (that is, thermal energy) becomes reduced at two edges Pe in the secondary scanning direction (that is, an alignment direction of the laser light (channel (ch) numbers 1 through n) irradiating the plate P shown in FIG. 12) of the recording head as compared to a center Pc where the laser light is co-adjacent (i.e., the laser beams are adjacent to other laser beams on both sides). Thus, there is a situation where irregularities formed on a surface of the plate P become smaller and banding occurs in a printed image.                Related Art: Japanese Patent Laid-open Publication No. 2007-253520        